Uruguay Becomes Another Communist Country by Atila Guimaraes

International Affairs

Uruguay Becomes
Another Communist Country

Atila Sinke Guimarães

Understandably, the last U.S. presidential election diverted attention from what happened in the Uruguayan elections, which also took place in November. But now is a good moment to analyze what occurred there. In that small South American country situated between Brazil and Argentine, Communism for the first time effectively came to power.

This map shows the blindness of those who say that Communism is dead

The new president, Tabare Vasquez, is the candidate of the Broad Front, a leftist political group dominated by nothing less than an old terrorist tupamaro movement. Tupamaro was the Uruguayan communist guerrilla movement of the ‘60s and ‘70s that was persecuted by several governments. Finally, it moved above ground, transforming itself into a small political party that is the main political force of the Broad Front today.

Soon after the elections, Vasquez declared: “We want to dedicate this triumph to those giants who are no longer with us,” referring to Raul Sendic, the radical communist founder of the tupamaro movement and Liber Seregni, founder of the Broad Front. Thanks to them, Tabare Vasquez continued, “hope won out over fear.” He was repeating a popular slogan exploited in Lula’s victory in Brazil. Different from Lula, however, the new Uruguayan president will govern counting on the majority in Congress. The man who received the most votes in this refurbished Congress was Pepe Mujica, another tupamaro guerrilla who was in jail for 14 years (Adista, November 15, 2004, pp. 10-1).

This election adds yet another nation to the extreme-left ensemble of countries in South America that is severely against the U.S. and favorable to Communism – Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, and Uruguay.

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Posted January 7, 2005